Shoppers arriving at the Encinitas Home Depot over Memorial Day weekend were disappointed to see the Dog House Diner was gone. The popular 1950s-style food stand sat at the entrance to the store for over ...

The San Diego lifeguard statue in Ocean Beach, dedicated in a ceremony last week (May 23), has been vandalized. Last night, May 30, someone painted portions of the statue in three different colors. In a ...

Three days of long nights, and the perpetrator is a fellow ex-pat named Mike Stax. The 30-year anniversary of Stax’s magazine, Ugly Things, was celebrated by players past and present. Santa Ana’s the Neumans kicked ...

“Finding the fluorescence in the junk” is the first line Bradford Cox sings on opening track “Neon Junkyard.” It stands as a descriptor of Deerhunter’s Monomania. The fuzz-rock band from Atlanta is back. After all, ...

San Diego may not quite qualify as America’s Fittest City, but the region is definitely in the hunt, according to figures newly released from the American College of Sports Medicine. The group’s sixth annual report ...

The South Bay Drive-In Theatres on Coronado Avenue in South San Diego recently updated its projection booths to digital. The digital conversion is being forced on all movie theaters by the major movie studios, which ...

After a nearly two-and-a-half-hour hearing, the La Mesa City Council on May 28 voted 4-1 on actions to allow the construction of a 198-unit apartment complex on an 8.64-acre site located at 7834 Parkway Drive. ...

On the west coast of India, the state of Karnataka has a spectacular 300-kilometer-long rocky coastline dotted with pristine white sand beaches. The most popular are Murudeshwar, Kumta, Malpe, Gokarna and Maravanthe. Along Karnataka’s coast, ...

Wednesday, May 29

Some Ramona residents don’t like at all the plan to install 42 acres of solar panels on a neighboring property…mostly for aesthetic reasons, despite assurances, promises, and revised plans from the contractor.

Strollers at the Imperial Beach Pier were recently greeted by a sign at the entrance proclaiming that improvements — mainly refurbishing and replacing worn, warped, wooden planks — are being carried out “at no cost ...

It had been cold and cloudy when I’d dressed that morning, and the commencement ceremony wasn’t scheduled to begin until 4:30 p.m.; it never occurred to me that I might find myself trapped for over ...

As Before Midnight draws near to its titular hour, Jesse (Ethan Hawke) gets a mid-argument chance to make a list of his beloved Celine’s (July Delpy) flaws. “Well, for starters, you’re fucking crazy,” he begins ...

There’s been a bit of argument lately in San Diego over how and how much tourist tax money to spend promoting San Diego to out-of-towners as a visitor destination, but meanwhile the State of Louisiana ...

Heymatt: I do a lot of long-distance driving and keeping myself alert and wakeful is always a challenge. Drinking coffee and caffeinated energy drinks like Red Bull and whatnot is a pretty good strategy to ...

Female-fronted garage-rockers Gone Baby Gone are once again minus a drummer. “Truth be told, our drummers seem to have commitment, health, or mental issues that keep them from playing shows, rehearsing, or touring,” says singer ...

The Teamsters Union’s public affairs council and utility giant Sempra Energy have something in common: Both gave $2500 last week to the San Diego County Democratic Party, only the recent of many off-year special-interest contributions ...

The border sewage plant that treats Mexican sewage, which the International Boundary and Water Commission oversees, has had two violations of treatment standards since February — far fewer than preceding years. One of the violations ...

A replacement for Tony Haymet, the former director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego and a global warming champion with close links to Democratic ex–vice president Al Gore ...

Tuesday, May 28

I am continually amazed over the stillness of the Gaslamp Quarter during daytime hours. It’s an eerie sight to find the streets empty of cocktail dress and dangerously tall stiletto clad bar goers. At 12pm ...

Varsav (Warsaw) is a large, booming city full of treasures. The Royal Łazienki Park offers palaces, gardens, lakes and forests in a less intimidating, family-friendlier format than Versailles. Animals in the park include peacocks, squirrels, ...

Monday, May 27

Construction of Kensington Commons has begun, five years after residents agreed to drop a lawsuit filed over environmental concerns.

Construction has begun on three-story mixed-use development Kensington Commons. The presence of bulldozers and earth movers at the corner of Adams Avenue and Marlborough Road is a sight that many Kensington neighbors tried desperately to ...

On Memorial Day, May 27, at 8:30 a.m., San Diego police responded to a citizen’s call at Sunset Cliffs Natural Park. Early-morning surfers were surprised to find a low-tide rave taking place in a sea ...

Sunday, May 26

An enthusiastic crowd estimated at over 1000 gathered at the fountain in Balboa Park on May 25 as part of the international “March Against Monsanto.” The event took place simultaneously in 45 countries and 400 ...

Saturday, May 25

On Thursday, May 23, Heal the Bay representatives met at the mouth of the Tijuana River to announce their annual “beach report card.” While the organization gave the majority of San Diego County high grades ...

The Escondido City Council on May 22 voted 4-1 to lease a portion of the city’s East Valley Community Center to Heritage Digital Academy, a charter school. The ten-year lease includes 20,000 square feet of ...

The San Diego City Council wrapped up this month's budget hearings with a May 22 evening meeting. The agenda included mayor Bob Filner's revisions to the proposed 2014 budget. Public comment lasted nearly two hours ...

Following on the heels of Amy Winehouse and Adele, Jessie Ware is the latest in an ever-expanding line of soul-inflected female pop singers from the U.K. But where the two superstars made vocal drama their ...

Devendra Banhart brought his multilingual show to the Belly Up, and from what I could see in the dim lighting and from behind some girls iPad (really, people?), he appeared in fine, if restrained form. ...

Thirty minutes into a healthcare workers rally at UC San Diego Thornton Hospital, La Jolla, on May 21, a healthcare technician in blue scrubs approached the microphone and said a deal had been reached between ...

Everyone’s a writer. Or so it seems these days with all the blogs and gossip and news sites. Communication and journalism degrees are still being sought after by college students… but why? Recently CareerCast.com, a ...

Warren Carter, of The QualiFind Group, explains the importance of dressing for success. First, please tell me what you do. I’m the founder and president of The QualiFind Group. We are composed of three separate ...

On Friday, May 17, teachers from Sweetwater’s Regional Occupation/Career Technical Education program attended a hearing in district offices in hopes of averting their fate — they are scheduled to lose their jobs in June. Last ...

Compassion isn’t a word that is easily digested in the business world. More often, we like to define our businesses as results-oriented, hard-driving and able to steamroll any obstacles that stand in the way of ...

Three armed thieves boarded a Tijuana city bus bound for an outlying campus of the Autonomous University of Baja California on Tuesday, May 21, and robbed about 50 terrified passengers, most of them students. The ...

Food trucks have reportedly been causing unsafe traffic conditions while they sell snacks to children as they leave Joli Ann Leichtag Elementary School in the afternoon. According to Hector Romans, the father of two daughters, ...

The Allied Gardens SpringFest board will meet later this month to discuss the future of the two-day celebration, SpringFest president Sherry Kelly said in a May 21 interview. The 14th annual SpringFest, held last weekend, ...

If you’ve already had your fill of illusory summer movie magic, why not set aside the comic books and spend some time watching the Iron Man of misrepresentation. In the hands of crackerjack conjurer Ricky ...

“I’m doing a release show for my Great Big World solo CD at Café Ipé on Pacific Coast Highway in Leucadia on Sunday, May 26,” says former Roxy Dioxide singer/guitarist Scott Samuels, who’ll be performing ...

Cars lined up for the first weekend of night-fishing at Lake Jennings on May 17. The lake — actually a water-supply reservoir — is open until midnight every Friday and Saturday night until Labor Day. ...

Thursday 23“I’ve been starting over for a long time,” sings Mikal Cronin on this summer’s briny beaut, MCII, a heady headphone set that demands a beachside romp and a re-evaluation of what passes for garage-pop ...

Daniel Bucheli, a staffer for Republican congressman Darrell Issa (who has of late been watchdogging the Obama administration’s Benghazi record), recently took a two-day free trip up the road from the nation’s capital to visit ...

With the battle over San Diego medical pot parlors raging between the city council and mayor Bob Filner and full-on legalization unfolding in Washington and Colorado, it’s probably not too surprising that more marijuana is ...

Tuesday, May 21

For many brewing companies, expansion means opening a tasting room in a different neighborhood, constructing an ell or a whole other building. Recently, those with the funds and the demand, including San Diego’s own Green ...

Late last month, Tijuana hoteliers and restaurateurs were celebrating a respite from generally bleak economic circumstances when the Mexican National Olympics got under way in Baja California. Authorities estimated that hotel occupancy would reach 90 ...

Monday, May 20

Rebuilding Together San Diego's Logan Heights warehouse is jammed to the ceiling with rugs, cabinets, light fixtures and wiring, doors and windows, and even deep-fat fryers for turkey and the oil used to cook them. ...

In its history as a unified nation, Japan has had three major capitals. Tokyo (the modern capital) and Kyoto (the longest-serving capital) garner most of the international visitors. Tokyo draws those who want to see ...

Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center Pacific (SPAWAR) reported that one of its Navy dolphins discovered an old torpedo last month just off the shore of the Hotel Del Coronado, during a mine-hunting training exercise. ...

Friday, May 17

Today (May 17) is National Bike to Work Day, celebrated annually on the third Friday in May, and the San Diego Association of Governments, along with others in regional government, have gone to considerable lengths ...

Every summer, my daughter's hair turns green. No matter how much I spend on chlorine-fighting shampoo or how religiously I rinse her white-blonde tresses after swimming, it inevitably develops an aqua tint. I worry that ...

In April, coastal drivers on Carlsbad Boulevard (Coast Highway) may have wondered why the city sandblasted away all the pedestrian crosswalk markings, especially in light of the reported overkill by the city in pedestrian signage ...

The quiet shoreline of Muir Beach is set among centuries-old redwoods on a remote stretch of Northern California coast. You'll feel a million miles away from the hustle and bustle of nearby San Francisco. At ...

The Monday, May 13, meeting of the Sweetwater Union High School District was raucous…again. The potential agreement with Alliant University was one source of contention. Trustee Bertha Lopez said while she supported choices for students, ...

Swimmers and lifeguards at Playas de Tijuana saved a stranded dolphin on the evening of Tuesday, May 14, as it floundered about in the beach shallows. According to 14-year-old beach-goer Azul Garibaldi, the youthful delfin ...

The 48 protest letters from property owners fell short of the 6451-majority needed to block the sewer-rate increase that the La Mesa City Council approved unanimously on May 14. Provisions in Proposition 218, which voters ...

The once-booming curio business on Tijuana's Avenida Revolución has dwindled to a trickle as the tastes of tourists who still visit what was once known as "the most traveled avenue in the world" have shifted, ...

In my capacity as a travel writer, I journeyed through much of Mali's Sahara Desert with the fabled Blue Men in the years before it was desecrated by Al-Qaida. For two thousand years, Tuareg nomads ...

A group of North Park/University Heights residents gathered at the intersection of Texas and Polk streets on May 15 at 6 p.m. for an informal meeting with three San Diego Police Department officers. The “Cookies ...

Wednesday, May 15

Local preservationist group Saving Our Heritage Organisation has issued a call for participants in a renewal of its Adobe University program to train modern amateur craftsmen in the art of adobe construction. According to a ...

Stripes have always been in. Your grandmother once rocked stripes and probably still does. They are as much of a wardrobe staple as a crisp white button-down. Whether they are subtle, chunky, thick, pin,zig-zag, horizontal ...

‘If life gives you limes, make margaritas,” I sang, channeling my best Jimmy Buffett. “If life gives you hordes of guests, buy margarita mixes,” responded my man Patrick. We were in the midst of planning ...

Depending on who you believe, the origins of the Baja-style fish taco will take you two places. Fans of entrepreneurial success stories will favor the narrative popularized by San Diego restaurant mogul Ralph Rubio, who ...

Star Trek into Darkness is a showcase for director J.J. Abrams at his most J.J. Abrams-y. Do you identify Abrams by his fondness for lens flares? You will not be disappointed. Lens Flare spends enough ...

Heymatt: Okay, I’m sure there are more pressing questions out there but, what causes bubble butt? For some people, it’s like their body weight accumulates disproportionately around the hips and booty, even if they don’t ...

Dear Matt: Please help my poor husband solve his ongoing perplexity. When there are perfectly good and relatively new wheelchair ramps on each corner of an intersection, why do we see crews tearing them out ...

Maybe it was because they were still recovering from New Year’s Eve, but state legislators seemed to go easier on the receipt of corporate freebies during the first three months of this year. That’s not ...

The main trailhead leading to the peak of 1591-foot-high Cowles Mountain is scheduled to reopen May 18, a date coinciding with Explore Mission Trails Regional Park Day, a celebration for the park that includes Cowles ...

A $4.3 million renovation is under way at the former Quality Inn at 751 Raintree Drive in Carlsbad. After the facelift is complete, the three-story, 125-room hotel will become a Holiday Inn Express. The construction ...

In February, Monkey Paw Pub & Brewery (805 16th Street, East Village) brewmaster Derek Freese unexpectedly gave notice at the brewpub so he could take a job with Point Loma work-in-progress Modern Times Beer. He ...

During construction of a highway ramp in San Diego’s North County last month, a paleontologist working for a local museum spotted some ancient bones in the dirt. Brad Riney, who is described as a “paleontological ...

Saturday mornings were usually quiet affairs at the Escondido home of Gary Johnson, board member of Escondido Country Club Homeowners Organization. However, Saturday morning, May 11, was different. At 9:00 a.m., about 200 Escondido Country ...

At 7:00 this morning, California State Parks personnel began the process of opening the Los Peñasquitos Lagoon in Del Mar. On hand are Natural Resources personnel as well as heavy-equipment operators, lifeguards, and maintenance crews. ...

Sweetwater Union High School District superintendent Ed Brand will be bringing another university plan to the board of trustees on May 13. In January of this year, the district made a controversial agreement with the ...

Saturday, May 11

Business owner Steve Amster is about to fight city hall — again. He says the City of Encinitas’ sign ordinance discriminates against small businesses such as his while it gives special privileges to corporate stores ...

The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) held a meeting at Casa Familiar’s arts and cultural center in San Ysidro on Thursday, May 9, to display plans for a massive reconstruction of the San Ysidro Port ...

Imagine any Mr. and Mrs. Smith and their six-year-old daughter Suzie from Cairo, Illinois. They have just finished touring England on a bus. At Heathrow, they check in for their flight home. They give their ...

Tijuana police have arrested one of their own for allegedly extorting money from a woman trying to make a living by selling churros on a well-traveled public sidewalk in the eastern part of the city, ...

Iconic rock band the Rolling Stones continues to defy the odds with their ability to seemingly turn back the hands of time. After 50 years, they continue to fill arenas, ignite crowds, and deliver Satisfaction ...

Phoenix's 2009 album, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, was a commercial and critical hit. It brought the French band to the world stage. This year, fresh off a headlining spot at Coachella, they keep up the pace ...

The long-planned, controversial Walgreens store in Hillcrest is well under construction at 301 University Avenue. The former vacant structure, last used for medical offices, was on the site located directly across University from Urban Mo's ...

I’ve been traveling around the world for years and always attempt to practice socially responsible tourism. I had read about the Ariau Amazon Towers for several years and decided to make it my eco-lodge destination ...

Over 1000 people of all ages donned Victorian fashion mixed with sci-fi gadgetry and converged at the Town & Country hotel during the May 3–5 third-annual Gaslight Gathering steampunk convention. Attendees were welcome to participate ...

When a company produces a new widget, that is is the culmination of months or maybe years of research, development, design, and manufacturing. But the work is not over yet. When a software company designs ...

This week, fourth in a six-part series, business coach Kate Kerr (nee Hanley) explains the importance of using LinkedIn to step up your job search or job upgrade your process. We’ve talked about the key ...

Revanna Gonzalez and Vanessa Gamez love what they do: on top of work, family, and attending college, they coach cheerleaders for the Sweetwater Union High School District…or, they used to. Revanna and Vanessa were former ...

Anyone who’s seen the screamy, thudding trailers for Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby knows that it is not a paint-by-numbers cinematic re-presentation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s elegant, economic novel. The numbers are there, of course: ...

Hey, Matt: During the 1992 Winter Olympics, speed skiing was a demonstration sport. Speed skiing is just another name for schussing. Knowing some physics, I commented that this sport was silly because (all other things ...

"Families are terrorized by their weakest member,” says a character in Jon Robin Baitz’s Other Desert Cities. The line’s got that yowza zing to it, as if a fire-spewing profundity. But give it some thought ...

At their monthly meeting on May 7, members of the Oceanside Senior Anglers fishing club received an update on the Navy’s effort to increase recreational fishing and protect coastal resources. Mitch Perdue, senior biologist from ...

"Did you hear about Graham?” I shook my head and smiled because I imagined some hilarious Graham-shenanigan story was forthcoming. My friend’s face was somber as she reported, “He’s in the hospital. He was in ...

Will Barton was walking home late one night in October 2012 when Philip Martin Hernandez, on a crime rampage with his young wife (Cindy Altamirano Garcia), shot him a few times and left him for dead. As he struggles to heal, health insurance companies create barriers.

Those with a hankering for gourmet hospital food may hope that a recent sponsorship opportunity by UCSD’s health system is repeated. According to an online fundraising flier, a $25,000 “masters” sponsorship of the health system’s ...

Thursday 9Freaky folkie Devendra Banhart’s evolution/devolution from the charmed if awkward songsmith of his early four-track output (listening to Oh Me Oh My as I type) into a full-fledged hippie-jam-band leader (Crippled Crow) into this ...

For the first time in many years, according to the Wildlife Research Institute, a young pair of bald eagles are nesting and raising a single offspring. The eaglet is about one month old, according to ...

After a presentation on the City of San Diego's proposed 2014 budget, participants at a May 4 Community Budget Alliance event learned how to write and give testimony of two minutes or less during the ...

Monday, May 6

On the first Sunday of each month, from March to October, UPS drivers Steve Sherman and Frank Renteria put the brakes on delivering packages to North County residents and host Car Show Sundays in the ...

I found Lindbergh Field customer service employee Laurice Richie grocery shopping at Food for Less in Lemon Grove (I am on a serious budget).The 19-year-old wore a pale pink maxi dress from Foreign Exchange and ...

Unexpected. That’s the word that comes to mind when I think about my recent trip to Cambria, California. Cambria, located roughly a half hour north of San Louis Obispo, reminded me of the Midwest somehow. ...

A suspected drug dealer was shot to death in a Zona Norte nightclub on Friday, May 3, at around half past noon. The bar, named Malquerida ("bad girlfriend"), on the corner of Constitución and Callejon ...

Mesa College fashion and design students are holding their 32nd annual Golden Scissors fashion show on Friday May 10th, 5:30-9pm at the Sheraton Hotel and Marina. What sets Golden Scissors apart from other fashion shows ...

Thursday, May 2

"We want drug-dealing gangbangers to feel more at home in the back seat."

"Right now," said San Diego Po-Po Super-Chief William "Hands Down" Lansdowne at the cruiser's inaugural pump-n-bump, "there is a stigma associated with police cruisers. Hoodlums feel self-conscious about being taken downtown in such spec machines." ...

A broken-down motorhome was fortunate to receive the aid of a backhoe from a nearby construction project during the morning hours of Wednesday, May 1. The Fleetwood Tioga conked out and blocked the road along ...

Isla Mujeres, once home to occasional pirates and Mexican fishing families, has become a popular off-the-beaten-path destination for tourists and divers as well as an expat art colony. Many tourists visit the island as a ...

The Cranes Are Flying is a groundbreaking movie that escaped the Soviet’s relentless orthodoxy to celebrate individuality during war. The stunning Tatiana Samoilova is Veronika, a girl in love with a soldier. A simple story ...

Adorned with the parti-colored relics and memorabilia of winged battle’s golden age, the 94th Aero Squadron Restaurant has the look and feel of a rural French chalet that’s been commandeered by World War I flyboys. ...

Two grad professors have taught and praised The Decalogue in their poetry/fiction classes this semester. Originally airing in the late ’80s on Polish television, The Decalogue is a collection of ten potent vignettes loosely corresponding ...

Heymatt: Why do gender-specific, single-occupancy restrooms exist? I see things like, for example, a queue of women outside the women’s room when there is plenty of space in the adjacent men’s room, or vice-versa. Why ...

Back on February 15, ex-GOP assemblyman Nathan Fletcher tweeted his fans with some big news: “Just accepted award from Chancellor Khosla for work on behalf of UCSD while in the legislature.” The former San Diego ...

Not Easy Being Green Don Bauder was right to highlight SDG&E’s high electricity rates for San Diego (City Lights: “You Pay Highest Electric Rates In San Diego,” April 25). But he made no mention of ...